A.D. 1210.] EXCOMMUNICATION OF ΟΤΙΙΟ. being tortured gave up all tliey had and promised more, that they might thus escape; one of this sect at Bristol, even after being dreadfully tortured, still refused to ransom himself or to put an end to his sufferings, on which the king ordered his agents to knock out one of his cheek-teeth daily, until he paid ten thousand marks of silver t o him; after they had for seven days knocked out a tooth each day with great agony to the .lew, and had begun the same operation on the eighth day, the said Jew, reluctant as he was t o provide the money required, gave the said sum to save his eighth tooth, although he had already lost seven. Of the excommunication of the emperor Olho. About that time, Otho the Koman emperor, remembering the oath which he had made on his elevation to the empire by the pope, namely, that be would preserve the dignity of the empire and, as far as lay in his power, would recall its scattered rights, caused an inquiry to be made, on the oaths of legal men, concerning the castles of his domain, and other rights appertaining to the imperial dignity, and whatever was found to belong to the throne he endeavoured to convert to his own use. On this there arose a serious dispute between the pope and the emperor, because when the throne of the empire was vacant, the said pope had taken possession of several castles with other things which pertained to the empire ; wherefore the emperor, because he endeavoured t o recover what was his own, aroused the hatred of the pop.' without deserving it. The same emperor also seriously annoyed Frederic king of Sicily, who had, in the same way, when the imperial throne was unoccupied, taken possession of some fortified places; whereupon the said pope by messengers and letters frequently warned the said emperor t o desist from this persecution of the church of Rome, as well as from disinheriting the king of Sicily, and the guardianship entrusted to the apostolic, see. In reply to these messengers of the pope the emperor is said to have made this answer ; "If," said he, "the supreme pontiff desires unjustly to possess the rights of the empire, let him release me from the oath which he compelled me to take on my consecration to I the imperial dignity, namely, that 1 would recover the alienated rights of the empire, and maintain those which I